Tuesday, April 18, 2017

This morning we are kicking off another Shopping Our Stash challenge, this time encouraging you to dig up some roses! No pun intended🌹... or was it???

Here's my creation, which is an art journal layout:

How about some process images? Okay!

So, this is what I started with. There are many ways to "shop your stash," and one way is to finish projects you've started... this spread was actually two independent pages that both happened to have roses on them... what luck! For the record, I never touched the top page -- it stayed the way I found it (a Nancy Drew page with LSG Magicals plus a library card with Teresa Collins modeling paste through Tim's roses stencil then Color Bursted and sprayed with Glimmer Mist). The bottom page had been inked with DOx in early March... actually, the first time I played with DOx. The circles are Seth Apter stamps.

Found this pre-clipped beauty in a zip-lock... I was like, "Well, no idea who to give credit to..."

...fast-forward a few hours: doing some spring cleaning, look what I found!-- a virgin sheet! Credit goes to Marsh Johnson.

Added these 7-year-old 7 Gypsies cards and coated them with a little white Liquitex gesso-- otherwise they faded right into the background.

Roses at bottom-left are years-old (3?), from a Creative Imaginations packet.

You can hardly see it, but I added some Dina Wakley Media Tape... definitely a stash item-- I don't use it as often as I ought.

Oh, goodness! Check out the cracks from the Distress crazing medium, accented with Vintage Photo Distress Stain. "Love" was writ with industrial stencils and black Liquitex gesso. It was outlined with WOS in gold, and some lovely Good Riddance lyrics were added.

Supplies: Well, I kind of shared the supply list during the process pictures, but I will just add that the tassels were from Michael's-- another dollar-bin stash item. I just attached them with a few slits, but since this book is still in use, I removed the tassels for storage. I'd like to think I'll re-attach them when this book is done... but my memory is terrible.

Hope your memory is better than mine and you don't forget to join us this week at Shopping Our Stash... dig up some roses! (Pun intended this time!)

For fabulous inspiration, visit the gardens of the SOS team's creative minds!

Monday, April 17, 2017

... I knew I wanted it to be a simple birthday card, but I'm disappointed with the lettering I decided on! I truly gave it done thought, and it looks like I just scribbled it on there! Gahhh... maybe I'll tear the panel off and fix that greeting!

I am relatively new to the die-cutting world. Autumn at Sew-Paper-Paint got wind about a year and a half ago that I did not have a die-cutting machine and-- get this -- sent me her Cuttlebug!!! Since then, I am slowly accumulating dies, but none are truly hoarded stash items yet... I use the dies I have fairly evenly...

Then last month I bought a Cricut Explore Air 2... holy Toledo. Geez. I'm slowly learning how to use that.

And of course I have a small stash of punches... mostly boring and practical, haha!

Supplies:

Library catalog card base coated with a layer of Teresa Collins modeling paste through a stencil made from a Tim Holtz Mixed Media die (those spots), and coated roughly with Weathered Wood Distress Paint... then it sat in my stash for months...

Fast-forward: I cut the card wth a Tim Holtz arch die

Card sprayed with Dylusions in Vibrant Turquoise

Card then smooshed in some Broken China DOx

Bundled Sage Distress Paint used initially to highlight the center, but that did not provide the brightness I was looking for, so I went wth some Liquitex gesso in white and further brightened the center, and also rubbed some on the edges. You can see my drying wasn't fast enough in between stages and the gesso really drew up the Vibrant Turquoise.

Finally, for the background, I sanded the spots a bit to help them stand out.

The gal is from one of Tim's pads. I splotched some Adirondack gold mixative on her and around the edges to make it appear old. I mounted the picture on a scrap piece of heavy packing kraft, cut to look like the base of an old photo. The kraft was inked with Frayed Burlap DO and misted for spots (though you can't see...). I snipped the edges with a Fiskars corner punch and wrote Debaser on it... what can I say... the song was on Modest Mouse radio. It's a song by The Pixies, and up until I included the link above, I had no idea what the song was about. Well, the girl *is* so groovy...

The flowers were already cut in my stash from a few weeks ago, and I added Color Burst to them. Yum.

The heart was also in my stash. It was cut with a Fiskars punch from a rejected watercolor panel.

Fiber was laying on my desk and it just matched the tag perfectly... originally from Andrea, thanks!

Here is the stash math: four dies used and two punches used. Not bad...

Join us! C'mon... it is beyond amazing to use stashed items, and it feels even better to share at Shopping Our Stash!

Monday, April 10, 2017

All paper is from my stash... can't recall who made the woodgrain, but the green polka-dots are from DCWV's succulent-building kit.

Dies are all Recollections

Trailer cut from a scrap of leftover watercolor paper and inked with DIs; curtains and door paper-pieced... I somehow smudged a curtain so I dabbed some Bundled Sage Distress Paint to try to cover it... rrr...

Tim's stitch-stamp run down either

Hearts also cut from scrap watercolor paper; stitching doodled with a Micron

This is the second card earmarked for the girls while at camp... I've got to get busy!

I will share this with the folks at Mod Squad. Their current challenge is to use paper-piecing. This isn't very intricate, but it's effective!

My girls will *both* be going to summer camp this summer, so I have to prepare now! (I hammer them with mail so they have to get up during mail call in front of the camp and sing songs like "I'm a little teapot" and the "Barney" theme to get their mail! Ah... the joys of parenthood...)

Supplies:

Background base is Tim Holtz resist paper

Background first inked with DOx in Broken China and Faded Jeans, then Vintage Photo, Peeled Paint and Cracked Pistachio

All dies from a Recollections set, this is their first use. "Happy Camper" cut from some previously inked Tim Holtz resist paper, and the trailer was cut from Strathmore watercolor paper and dressed up with DIs and a Micron 005

I used Tim's stitch stamp on the edges, then distressed them with a Making Memories distressing tool. (Just for info-sharing's sake: I also owned the Tonic tool and did not like it... the Making Memories tool is much more ergonomic.)

I'd like to share this at the following challenge:

HLS April AG with dies... what a funny language... I remember a couple years ago when I didn't know the lingo... HLS stands for Happy Little Stampers, and AG is Anything Goes! Hope that's helpful to at least one human.

Friday, April 7, 2017

I played with it a lot the day I carved it (the only craft day I had last week was fruitful!), so I will enter the various cards into various challenges...

Rainbow butterfly birthday:

Tim Holtz resist paper wth Color Bursts; butterfly stamped in Ranger Archival on Yupo which had been inked with a rainbow of Adirondack AIs; sentiment written with a Sharpie brush marker and highlighted with gel pens.